For a long time, people always thought that people with autism had problems with their brain and ONLY their brain.

If that really is the case, then why do so many children with AS/HFA have stomach and digestive problems too?  Sometimes the stomach problems happen when you eat a certain food like foods with wheat in them or foods with dairy in them.  They might cause you to have diarrhea or constipation or they may make you feel like you have less energy and might make you irritable or crabby towards others.

By not eating the foods that make you have stomach problems, sometimes your autism feels like it’s not as bad and that you can be more active and be around other people.  But wheat and dairy are very addictive foods!  It’s very difficult to not eat foods we are addicted to, even if they give us problems later.  It is very important to take care of our guts because if our guts don’t operate the way they are supposed to, we don’t get enough of the nutrients we need from our food.

There is a connection between our guts and our brains.  Think about it – when you get stressed (brain), sometimes you have bigger stomach aches (gut).  When the gut isn’t healthy, the brain isn’t healthy.  This is because toxins from wheat and dairy come through the gut and poison the rest of the body (especially the brain).

Don’t worry – you are not alone in not being able to eat what everyone else eats.  Many non-autistic people have diseases that effect their gut and their brain too.  Gut-brain diseases are celiac disease, ADD, ADHD, depression, irritable bowel syndrome.